How to doodle up a quikmap — a guide to the quikmaps editor
The quikmaps editor is reasonably simple, but there are a few quirks and juicy extras that I figure render a little guide useful. I’m going to assume, if you’re reading this, that you’ve been to quikmaps.com/new or quikmaps.com/edit.
Adding markers to the map
- Drag markers from the marker list onto the map
- Drag markers around the map to re-position them
- Left-click on a marker to add info to a particular marker
- Right-click on a marker to delete it
Adding connected lines to the map
- Click on ‘draw lines’ (it’s just above the map)
- Click a series of points on the map
- Click anywhere outside the map to finish and go back to ‘normal’ mode
- Drag the white line connectors to edit the line
- Right-click the white line connectors to delete parts of the line
Scribbling on the map
- Click on ’scribble’ (it’s just above the map)
- Hold down the left mouse button and start moving the mouse around — you’re scribbling!!
- Right-click on the scribbled lines to delete parts of them
Textual labels
- Drag the text label image onto the map (it’s under ‘other stuff’)
- Type your label in the input box that appears
- Drag the label around the map to re-position it
- Right-click on a label to delete it
Showing some other place on the map
Quikmaps should default to your home city (barring gaps in the Maxmind GeoIP database). However, if you’d like to move the map to somewhere else, type the place name in the ‘Go to’ box above the map (overwriting ‘my hometown’), and either press ‘Enter’ or click ‘Go’. You should either go where you expected to go or see a list of options. Quikmaps uses a combination of the Yahoo geocoding API and a local database based on the US National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency names server files. Quikmaps uses geonames.org’s geocoding service.
Clearing the map
Click the ‘Clear’ button.
nuff said?
Eviltesdall said,
June 27, 2006 @ 6:40 am
there is no zoom?
stelt said,
June 27, 2006 @ 7:20 am
Are you using SVG somewhere in the process?
If so, please let me know, so i can add a link to http://svg.startpagina.nl
todd c said,
June 27, 2006 @ 8:33 am
It would be great if i could zoom in…
Lindsay said,
June 27, 2006 @ 8:43 am
I would like to change the size of my map to fit neatly into a column on my webpage, but when I change the code’s width/height option, it just cuts off the map type buttons (sat, hybrid, map) and is no longer centered where i’d like it to be. There is probably an easy fix to this, but I’m not a computer programmer type…
thanks! this is fun!
-Lindsay
todd c said,
June 27, 2006 @ 8:46 am
never mind.. the controls didn’t show up the first time…
ken said,
June 27, 2006 @ 1:50 pm
Lindsay, on the ‘in your site’ page, you can re-size the map by dragging it’s bottom right corner. If you re-size the map this way, quikmaps will automatically adjust the width/height options in the code…
For those of you having trouble with the zoom in/out, you should be able to use the + and - buttons….
Enjoy!
Peabody said,
June 27, 2006 @ 9:43 pm
Howdy,
I noticed that when I go to the area I’m am interested in, I’m seeing alot of sreet names that show up as “Regional Road ##”. When I check the same spot on Google Maps, I see the proper names. What’s up?
BTW, this is a great tool! I hope to use it on my blog if this problem is temporary.
Cheers!
ken said,
June 28, 2006 @ 10:51 am
Unfortunately, quikmaps has not control over the map imagery available through the google maps API. So, any street name differences you see between maps.google.com and quikmaps are caused by google…
Elizabeth said,
June 28, 2006 @ 5:02 pm
Wonderful application. Can I add images or links to the pop-up info windows? (As in html?)
Thanks!
Elizabeth said,
June 28, 2006 @ 6:09 pm
A little reading on your blog, and I find out that I can add just about anything if I know the html.
Amazing. And easy to learn.
Jenny said,
June 28, 2006 @ 6:37 pm
I need to be able to zoom as there is not much more for me to see than I can see in an atlas.
enda said,
June 29, 2006 @ 3:33 am
hi ken, i like quicmaps instantly. but when i tried to save/generate code or save only it doesn’t work.
i am using windows xp and Firefox 1.0.7
Mapperz said,
June 29, 2006 @ 10:04 am
There seems to be a javascript error
Error: Expected ‘:’ but found ‘;’. Declaration dropped.
Source File: http://quikmaps.geotripping.com/stylesheets/quikmaps.css?1151422918
Line: 222
Which is a shame as was an excellent google map application.
Mapperz
www.mapperz.blogspot.com
X never marks the spot
Mark said,
June 29, 2006 @ 10:34 am
I didn’t sign up at first, but I think I will. I’d like to save a map I created, but it seems to be stuck in a temp account. Is there any way to move a map to a normal user account?
ken said,
June 29, 2006 @ 3:52 pm
Just catching up on the comments here:
Enda: Firefox is the best choice for quikmaps, but you’re using an old version. Try upgrading to the latest version (1.5.0.4, I believe).
Mapperz: Thanks for the bug spotting. What you found was actually a CSS bug, and not Javascript — this wasn’t affecting the functionality of the application, but, nevertheless, was a bug anyway…
Mark: Currently, there is no way for a user to move a map from a temp account to a normal user account. I can, since I have access to the database…
This is an issue we’ll be trying to solve down the road (i.e. signing up for an account while logged into a temp account transfers maps).
Tine Müller said,
July 1, 2006 @ 2:26 pm
What a great application. I’m new to GoogleMaps API and have the last week been studying this because I’m thinking about making a big project with this for a danish site BUT then I found your application and I think it would be a lot easier to make the project with your application.
Is there something important this application can’t do which GoogleMaps can do?
/Tine
ken said,
July 2, 2006 @ 11:21 pm
Tine,
In terms of your project, writing your own programs that interact with the google maps api will enable you to do lots of things that quikmaps doesn’t do. However, if quikmaps provides what you need, and you don’t want to do any programming, then I don’t think you’ll be missing anything.
jlemoine said,
July 3, 2006 @ 9:37 pm
Wow ! Great job !
Just a single remark : while using the iframe, the charset is “iso-8859-1″ but the text is encoded in unicode… This is annoying.
Nice pictures too.
david said,
July 4, 2006 @ 6:38 pm
I just created an account, and can’t seem to save a map… when i click “save” or “save and generate code”… nothing seems to happen, and nothing shows in “my maps”.
So, I just tried doing it as anonymous, and can’t save now either,
but, I was able to save a map about a week ago as anon.
Is the site having problems?
David
harry said,
July 5, 2006 @ 5:56 am
My map is 550 width.
I only want to enlarge it to 650.
Bur I did not manage to do it !
What I did:
- Been to “This map in your site”
- it opens cool and I drag the right line ti enlarge it
- Then …. well I don’t knox HOX TO VALIDATE the change …: I can’t see any button, like ‘OK’ or ‘Validate’ or ’save’
Does someone have a clue ?
harry@cafes-wifi.com
Sciurus said,
July 8, 2006 @ 12:20 am
It would be nice if a user could “go to” a street address. For instance, if I wanted to mark Google currently I would have to go to Mountain View, CA then click around until I found Google. It would be much easier if I could simply enter “1600 ampitheatre parkway mountain view, ca”.
Sciurus said,
July 8, 2006 @ 1:05 am
My girlfriend’s verdict: “It’s too much work”
The plan was to generate a map for an outing tomorrow- marks some shops and restaurants, draw lines showing the best routes among them, then add comments and pictures afterwards and share it on a blog.
The first complaint was the weak “go to” functionality. She had to keep google maps open in a seperate tab to see what streets any given address was between, then drag the quikmap around until she saw roughly the same spot to mark.
The second complaint was that when she switched to line mode, clicking two markers didn’t draw a line between them. She clicked help to find out how the line feature worked.
This leads to the third and fatal complaint. After reading the help, when she clicked the back button all her work was gone. She expected quikmaps data to act like google maps or the text in a form and be in the exact same state when she returned. Perhaps quikmaps could automatically save after a certain period of time, or at least provide a warning if you try to navigate away.
iggy said,
July 8, 2006 @ 11:26 am
Great tool, I like it very much.
Is there any way to connect a new line to a already existing one? If I click on the marker of the old line, it enters text editing and deletes both of my lines.
ken said,
July 8, 2006 @ 1:00 pm
iggy: Currently, no, you can’t connect a new line to an existing one. That’s a frustration I have too, but it hasn’t been dealt with yet.
Sciurus: Thanks for the time you took with your comment. As far as the ‘weak go to’, google has recently introduced geocoding (map addresses to points), so the go to field should include this soon. Currently, the go to field searches the geonames.org database for place names.
As for your final complaint, you’ve tapped into a raging debate within the web 2.0 community — that is, how the back button functions within interactive web pages. To implement your suggestion, quikmaps would have to save the map data somewhere when you leave the page, and reload it if you click the back button. It’s not completely impossible, but complicated… web browsers were not created with this sort of thing in mind.
Rich said,
July 10, 2006 @ 2:36 pm
First, thanks for creating a wonderful tool. Question about inserting pictures in the message box. Is there a special way to do it? I’ve just inserted tags and it works, but its flaky. The picture appears, but the message box doesnt wrap around it.
Cussy said,
July 14, 2006 @ 4:50 am
Great tool - any chance of adding to the marker icons? - especially a ‘north’ and a ’south’ direction arrow to go with the left and right ones please?
KathyO said,
August 3, 2006 @ 12:45 pm
This is fabulous! Just what we all need.
Have you or your users tested it on a Mac? I wouldn’t think it would matter, but I’ve tried it in Safari (2.0.3) and IE5, both for Mac OS X, and while Safari could put markers and lines onto the default hometown, I was not successful in getting it to GO to another start location. Curious if this is a Mac incompatibility.
Great work, regardless! Clearly from the other comments that part is working for most people.
kathyo
ken said,
August 3, 2006 @ 3:33 pm
kathyo,
The issues on Mac are a known problem. Try downloading firefox 1.5.x for your Mac — quikmaps should run fine there…
tallpaul said,
August 5, 2006 @ 12:58 am
hi. extremely cool. I just got referred here by some Cool Maps site, and it certainly is. Two points.
1) regarding Sciurus’ issue, about losing everything, I have two easy-to-implement suggestions. a) WARN people about this on the page, and b) open the help in a different window (at least I’m assuming that would work around this problem, if not solve it).
2) I’ve looked around here a bit and I haven’t found an overview description. IE, not how to edit a map, but what i can do with them, etc. EG, when I make a map, then will it have a URL and exist permanently, so I can email it or whatever?
thanks
Harry said,
August 15, 2006 @ 8:33 am
– question : time to show up the map–
Hello and thanks for this wonderfiull tools.
I would like to know something very inportant.
How many miliseconds more does a quick map shows up if
you add 100 more “simple points”(html link ans a word) on the Map.
I mean is it about 0.1 second more ? 1 second more ? 4 seconds more ?
My question is very imoortant because I have a Map with 110 points (wireless hotspots) ond I am thinking of adding about 100.
BUT only if the time to display does not change much…
Cussy said,
August 26, 2006 @ 4:50 am
Great piece of kit but so frustrating that there is no ‘turn up’ or turn down’ symbol (the little white arrow in the green circle). One that you could rotate to any angle would be even better, but one for each of up, down, left and right would be a start.
I don’t want to use the line or scribble tool to highlight the route, just a series of markers. It’s a real problem when you want to indicate to someone they have to turn ‘up’ or ‘down’ the map
Has anyone got a workaround for this problem please?
Cheers
@lz said,
October 6, 2006 @ 1:38 am
Hi, great tool,
Is it possible to make link directly on the icon? Now you have to click the “click me!!!” to open the textbox and then click ont the link within the box. I like to know if this is possible because I want to make a map with 1000+ pictures.
best regards
ken said,
October 6, 2006 @ 10:04 pm
@lz
Sorry, not currently possible.
I’d also advise against a map with 1000+ pictures (though you can try it!). 1000 markers is enough to bog down the google maps api in most cases, and should really be handled with some sort of dynamic loading.
@lz said,
October 7, 2006 @ 2:03 am
Hi Ken,
Thnx for your quick responce.
Too bad. I’ll try less than 1000+ for a smaller area.
Look at http://www.panoramsterdam.com and you see what I mean.
Rob said,
October 17, 2006 @ 1:36 pm
Can I copy a map into a Word file?
Sam said,
October 23, 2006 @ 12:33 pm
Really great tool and very simple to use! Was looking for sth like that for a while… But I can´t use it for my wordpress-blog! So sad… any possibility to solve that problem? For YouTube it´s also normally not possible but there´s a short piece of syntax that allows you to integrate their videos… Sth like that for quikmaps available???
Sally said,
October 23, 2006 @ 4:26 pm
Great! Love it! But….Since signing up and creating my first map, I keep getting an error message telling me that IE cannot open the page??? Anyone else having this problem?
ken said,
October 24, 2006 @ 10:39 am
Sam:
I believe wordpress.com blogs strip iframe tags, meaning you’ll have trouble posting a quikmap on your blog. YouTube uses a flash video player to get around this, but there’s no similar technology available for google maps.
Sally:
I reproduced the problem and it should be fixed now. Thanks for the heads up.
ken said,
October 24, 2006 @ 10:41 am
Oh, Rob, sorry I missed your comment.
I don’t think you can post a quikmap into a word document, unless word now handles iframes (i.e. embedded web pages). I don’t think it does…
Declan said,
November 8, 2006 @ 6:21 pm
Hi Ken - I love this and use it all the time for my bike group.
Maybe I’m missing it, but is there a “copy map” function? I’m playing with setting up bike routes, and I’d like to map a base route, then some options.
Thanks for the cool product!
D
RK said,
November 10, 2006 @ 10:06 am
So after playing with quikmaps - which by the way is great - I’ve realized that I have no idea how to edit the markers. I want to have links associated with each marker I add. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated. I have some experience with html, but coulnd’t figure out where/how to edit this.
thanks in advance.
ken said,
November 14, 2006 @ 3:34 am
Declan:
I’ve added a copy map function, so go ahead and use it to your heart’s content. I’d had the function in mind, but hadn’t gotten around to implementing it.
RK:
Click on a marker after dragging it onto the map. Then, when the info window pops up, add whatever html you’d like (excepting script tags).
Raf said,
November 16, 2006 @ 7:17 am
Awesome tool, thank you for putting this site together!
I have the following request;
Is there a method for adding a marker at a specific longitude/latitude? For example, if I wanted to place a marker on my house, either drag it to the map (today’s functionality) or give the tag the lat. and long.for the specific location.
Thanks in advanced,
Raf
Mark said,
November 21, 2006 @ 3:37 pm
Hi,
Is there any way to locate markers by latitude/longitude? My students have lat/lon for their assigned plots at a field student site. It would be ideal if they could place the markers using the lat/lon.
Great site! Maps display perfectly in our WordPress site.
Mark
Leslie Cuthbertson said,
November 24, 2006 @ 10:35 am
Hello,
I love this program! At last something that works for my needs! My only problem is that in my zeal to complete my assignment - (I spent 4 hours plotting almost 400 communities that our organization reaches….) I didn’t realize that I had to sign in as a user to be able to access the map for editing at a later date. As a temporary user my map is no longer accessible to me. I would really really appreciate it if somehow you could make my map accessible through my new user account! Please help me! Thanks so much! - Leslie
jan said,
December 8, 2006 @ 4:49 am
there is an bug while exporting to Iframe:
i want to use the hybrid-view, but it only shows the satellit-view. in the Iframe-url the parameter “mt” is set to 1 and must be set to 2.
ken said,
December 19, 2006 @ 2:10 pm
Sorry everyone for the late replies, as I’m just getting back to quikmaps after some time onsite with a client…
Mark:
Currently there’s no way — it may come in a later version, but I can’t guarantee anything.
Jan:
Your point is taken. I’ll look into it.
ken said,
December 20, 2006 @ 3:24 pm
Jan:
You were exactly right. I’ve fixed the bug…
blackwing said,
December 22, 2006 @ 12:49 am
Thank you for this great tool - it saved me from digging into GoogleMap API…
But I think I spotted another bug…
When moving points in a line, I get additional points in my preview - exactly at the place where the old ones had been at. And those phantom-dots are not removable by right-click.
In IE it is also not possible to wipe parts of a scribble line by right-click…
Firefox works perfect in this case.
Additionally it does not work for me, to copy the iframe statement into a posting cause it ends up in, that after this object is rendered no more text (whether in the same div or other) and divs/postings whatever get rendering - neither at firefox, nor at ie6.
The website itself is xhtml / css compliant by w3c and rendered correct without the iframe…
Great enhancements would be:
- Undo button
- Feature to draw lines from marker to marker
Thanks anyway for all your efforts!
blackwing said,
December 22, 2006 @ 1:16 am
the display bug is related to a wordpress bug. so just dont care about that - wordpress people got a notice about that.
Thanks & Merry christmas!
twobob said,
January 8, 2007 @ 5:09 am
Ken - I love your work man! I think this is one of the easiest map building sites on the web!
Maybe I missed it on the help page, but is it possible to amend the label in the text boxes? I also like the idea above about having the help page launch into a new window … that way users won’t lose any of the map they’ve worked on before clicking on the help button.
Keep up the great work - it is appreciated by thousands of us out there!
Cheers … twobob
Tanya said,
January 9, 2007 @ 1:03 am
Any ideas on being able to save this file for use in another application? Ideally as a JPEG or something so I can insert it into a Word Doc. I have tried to export it but the format it gets exported in(GXT?) I can’t open… does anyone know how I can get around this? Thanks!
Tans
Australia
BernardMarx said,
January 14, 2007 @ 8:28 pm
I made a map before creating an account. I liked what I saw, so I created an acoount, but now I can’t edit my old map. Can you help?
BernardMarx said,
January 14, 2007 @ 8:30 pm
Or if I wanted to could I develop on top of someone elses map and then “save as” a new version?
ken said,
January 15, 2007 @ 12:41 pm
Tanya:
You unfortunately can’t export maps to JPEG format (or any other image format, for that matter). It’s a copyright issue in regards the map imagery which Google licenses from third parties, and is actually against the Google maps terms of service.
BernardMax:
I’ve sent you an email — send me your permanent user name and the map id and I’ll copy it over for you. You can’t copy a map that you didn’t create yourself, so that strategy won’t work for you.
F. Roewekamp said,
January 26, 2007 @ 7:35 am
Thank you, you are doing a very good web online job.
Frank / Berlin-GER
rich said,
February 8, 2007 @ 1:20 pm
is there a limit for how many markers we can put on our account
Emily said,
March 3, 2007 @ 5:14 am
This is a great tool - from my first searches it seemed I was going to have to learn JavaScript and do something hard to get non-US addresses. Thank you so much!!
Of course I’d love more .. Is there any way to search the map? I’m trying to create a guide to my favorite places and it would be great to be able to type in “bar” to find all the bars or “bakery” . .Especially cool if a list of places categorized “bar” could come up on the side and clicking on one would take you to that point on the map. I’m a total newbie to making anything on the web - would it be easy to export the map to my home page and then build seach tools around that?
milnewstbay said,
April 20, 2007 @ 6:28 am
Tried logging in this morning (20 Apr 07, around 9:30am EDT), but I can’t get in to edit my maps.
????
Thanks!
Kelsey said,
June 27, 2007 @ 7:30 am
The map of Williamsburg, Iowa you have the mall where the high school is and its kind of confusing.
ken said,
June 27, 2007 @ 9:24 am
Kelsey,
The maps on Quikmaps are provided by Google, who, in fact, don’t collect the data but purchase their information from a collection of sources. If you’re concerned about correctness, the Williamsburg map data comes from Navteq, and you’ll need to contact them.
Greg said,
July 26, 2007 @ 9:50 pm
A very good tool for a non programmer like myself.
Is there a way to add a working hyperlink to the text box that opens on a map point? May thanks.
Jim Ducey said,
July 28, 2007 @ 12:21 pm
Greetings:
How are hyperlinks added to a text box. I would also like to include a photo. I could not find the means to include these. It would be so much more interesting to include a richer set of information…
jim
Mike said,
August 20, 2007 @ 7:01 am
Great to see this. i hope to use it a lot. BUT.. using Mac OS X and both Firefox 1.5.0.8 and Safari 2.0.4 I find I can’t resize my map, as instructed, because I can’t click on and move the bottom righthand corner. The only thing anywhere near there I can click are the Terms of Use!
Hope I’m just miossing something obvious?
James said,
August 30, 2007 @ 1:15 am
LOVE IT! I’m living in China, where we can get Google maps in Chinese (3rd party) or only the satellite view in the regular maps.
I want to add street names to my maps, as they aren’t there in satellite view. So my question is: Is there a way to make a vertically-oriented label, for marking north/south streets? Is there a way to turn a label 90 degrees?
Thanks.
peace,
James
elena said,
September 6, 2007 @ 9:44 am
Some Help!
I add html code to add a link to marker… it does not work!
how can I do that?
Joshua said,
September 18, 2007 @ 6:54 am
Greate article, very useful, thanks.
ken said,
September 25, 2007 @ 3:06 pm
elena - add something to the info box, and you should have a link. Make sure you remember to prefix the url with http://.
Hannah said,
September 27, 2007 @ 7:20 am
Hi,
When I try and save and generate code the code given says the page is unavailable? Help!
Valencia F1 said,
February 7, 2008 @ 10:57 am
Hello, I read in the comments that we can add some links in a description but I don’t succeed in doing it, could you show us anexample? Thanks
ken said,
February 7, 2008 @ 9:38 pm
Valencia,
You need to enter the HTML anchor code.
Try: <a href=’http://google.com’>google.com</a>
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Peter said,
April 2, 2008 @ 5:51 am
Hi there,
great job! I’ve only one question left:
Will my map be deletet after some time?
I’ve already made an account and drawed a lot into it - would be a mess if I would lose this map.
Thx for your answer.
Greets Peter
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Kathleen B. said,
April 28, 2008 @ 4:31 pm
Hi Ken,
Thank you for developing this, it’s proving to be a very useful tool. I have one question….when I add marker info it seems to be running together, but I have seen other quickmaps where the marker info text is very neat and even bolded. How do I do this?
Any feedback would be appreciated,
Kathleen B.
ken said,
April 29, 2008 @ 11:17 am
Hi Kathleen,
Quikmaps accepts most HTML tags (b,i,em,p,etc..) in the marker info. If you’re not familiar with HTML grab a quick-start guide from somewhere - that should be enough to get you going.